


you feint, I’ll fall

by ninemoons42



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Alternate Universe - Quidditch, Awkward Crush, Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Inter-House Rivalries, M/M, Quidditch, Rival Relationship, Rivalry, School Dances, Secret Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-20
Updated: 2015-03-20
Packaged: 2018-03-17 16:10:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3535754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninemoons42/pseuds/ninemoons42
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the following prompt by <strike>ChilliConCarney</strike> HawkeyeOut, which is also a great summary:</p><blockquote>
  <p>Steve and Bucky are respective captains of the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff Quidditch teams. After an agonizingly close game between the two they become sworn enemies, but maybe there's something a bit more to their relationship than they previously thought....</p>
</blockquote>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gayliens](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gayliens/gifts).



> Written for the Steve/Bucky BB Spring Fling 2015.

Up here, the voices from the pitch were almost muted.

Up here, he could no longer make out the individual kits, scarlet versus yellow. All he could see was twisting flight, rapidfire maneuvering. The intricate dance of tactics and of balls being batted back and forth, zipping, very nearly faster than his eyes could see.

Up here, it was _cold_ , and he might have been wearing three layers beneath his kit and an extra jumper over everything else, but he might as well have been naked. The wind bit at his face and his wrists and his throat with sharp chilled teeth.

A sinuous sweeping stately movement, crossing the pitch: Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors flying circles and spirals around each other, and then there was the other Seeker, flying as though he were swaggering down one moving staircase or another, perfectly balanced, perfectly at ease --

Whereas Steve could only hunch in on himself and had no idea where to put his feet and his hands and his shoulders. He’d grown. He’d changed. He’d had to ask for help with charming his clothes to fit. Stupid growth spurt.

He needed to distract the other Seeker, and he narrowed his eyes, scrubbed cold from his eyes and cold from his nose, and began to calculate: there were flight paths, there were trajectories, and there were about a dozen other people he had to fly past and not into --

He could do that. He knew that he was outsized and gawky and uncomfortable in his still-changing body, and he knew that he could still outfly anyone on the pitch, and he took a deep breath and gripped his broom more tightly, threw himself down --

And now Steve could hear the commentary again -- was that James Rhodes, from Ravenclaw? He couldn’t hear over the roaring wind and the sweet pounding thump of his heart -- and he dodged Natasha as she swung her bat and sent a Bludger flying. He flew alongside Sharon for a moment and she didn’t seem to see him, so engrossed was she in her drive towards the hoops at the far end of the pitch. Sam and Clint in tight formation up ahead.

He had to make this good, he had to pretend, or the other Seeker would just ignore him, and he put on an extra burst of speed, looking up and down and everywhere as though he were focused on something. He zigged and zagged, took one hand off his broom.

A shadow moving in the very edges of his peripheral vision. Steve did not risk looking back. He rocketed upwards instead, chasing nothing.

Scarlet flags and yellow banners, the Hufflepuffs cheering like mad, goal after goal scored. Steve swallowed and gritted his teeth and tried to keep the ruse up -- and every now and then he had to dodge, hurtling past Maria at the goals and Melinda hovering just below her and another Bludger, unless it was the same one --

Gold.

Something real.

Glittering flutter up ahead, whizzing out of sight.

The game was on and he needed to move: he didn’t know what the score was. Dare he go for that golden flash? Would it help? Could he make a difference?

He knew what the answer was.

He had to try.

And Steve was no longer feinting: now he strained forward, searching anew, and -- there, there, bright spark, and now he put everything he had into the chase.

No longer was there a shadow behind him, because the other Seeker was pulling abreast, his dark hair falling into his face, his gloved hand half-outstretched as Steve’s own was.

“The Seekers are going for the Snitch!”

Light, flashing and dodging, and Steve attempted to shoulder his opponent out of the way --

“Ow!”

Steve left that voice behind and leapt forward -- he was alone, just for a moment, and he forgot about everything else, Bucky Barnes actually complaining and the fact that Steve had never ever thought of himself as anyone’s equal in pure physical strength, and _reached_.

Movement, too close, and Steve took his eyes off the Snitch -- there was something or someone bearing down on him -- and he dismissed the threat, the incoming impact -- there was something fluttering against his fingertips, just out of reach, just right there -- !

And Steve let go of his broom, hands cupped and moving.

*

Bucky Barnes looked up from his pumpkin juice to Jim and Monty’s excited faces, and he really just wanted to either sink into the stones of the Great Hall, or -- or --

“We lost,” he muttered, mostly under his breath. “We lost and you’re happy?”

“It was a _good_ loss,” was Monty’s reply. “The kind of loss we ought to be proud of. Ruddy good match no matter which way you look at it.”

“What he means is that we honestly don’t mind losing to that kind of crazy Quidditch play,” Jim said around a mouthful of toast. “Better than the Falcons, better than the Harpies -- ”

“Better than the World Cup!”

Bucky glared at them both. “You’re crazy.”

“Actually the whole House is,” and Jacques was suddenly sitting next to him, and how he was managing to eat without getting crumbs on the massive Arithmancy book he was reading Bucky had no clue. “You have to think about it: why are we still talking about the match?”

“I wish you’d all stop,” Bucky said.

“Can’t. Not until the next one.”

Bucky groaned, and thunked his head against the table, and then --

“Hi, Rogers!”

A quiet clearing of throat. An unfamiliar voice.

“Hello,” and Bucky gritted his teeth and looked up, and sure enough: Steve Rogers. Crooked seams on his school robes, bandages around his visible wrists, and a ridiculously fluffy glove, in which lay --

“And what am I supposed to do with that,” Bucky asked. “Isn’t that _yours_? Fair catch and all?”

“It was almost yours, too.”

“And that’s why we _lost_.”

“You would have won if I hadn’t caught this when I did.”

“I’m aware of that, thank you,” Bucky said. He glanced at the Golden Snitch in that gloved hand. He wanted to take it and keep it, and he wanted to take it just to throw it in Rogers’s face. “Keep it. I already know I lost. I already know I have to beat you. Don’t need the reminder.”

This time he hid his face in his arms that were crossed atop the table, and he thought of Quidditch tactics and fouls, and there he stayed until the clocks began to toll for the first classes of the day, and when he looked up Rogers was gone.

*

Steve crossed back to the table in the corner of the library and put the Transfiguration books down, and Sharon threw a glance at him, waved her wand for a muffling spell, before murmuring, “Next match is in a week. What do we need to work on?”

He thought about it. “Better Quaffle control.”

Sharon nodded, and looked encouraging.

“And maybe we need to find a spell that will let each of us listen to the commentary. Like listening to the wireless, so we always know what the score is.”

“Unless we get distracted by the natter.”

Steve blew out a quiet breath. “Or that.”

“I can ask around; maybe the Ravenclaws already know something. Several somethings.” Sharon closed the book she was taking notes from and set it aside. “You don’t actually think you were _cheating_ , were you? Steve, feinting’s part of the game.”

“And what about a wild goose chase?”

He watched her roll her eyes. “Next you’ll be telling me that we’re not allowed to fake passes, or something.”

“Of course you are and -- ” Steve made a face at her. “It’s not the feinting that’s bothering me.”

“I know. We know. We were waiting for you to work it out.”

“I grew,” Steve said, and pointed helplessly at himself.

“And this is a problem how?” Sharon asked, gently.

“Now I can actually knock people over if I run into them?” He sighed. “I know, I know, you’re going to make me look up the types of fouls, and we’ll be here all day. I guess I’m not used to the part where I can be part of that now, too.”

Sharon laughed softly. “Ask Melinda to teach you.”

Steve shook his head, but he was laughing too, muffling the sound in one of his books.

*

A circle of red uniforms on the pitch. Gestures and expressions.

Bucky was in the stands so he couldn’t hear anything; all he could see was that the other Gryffindor players were encouraging one of their own. Reassuring him. Good-natured slaps to shoulder and to forearm, and one of them went right ahead and ruffled weedy blond hair, to wide grins.

The circle turned into a series of red streaks, into a cacophony of shouts and jeers and laughter and a half-derisive song, and he had to think about facing Slytherin in two weeks and he had no idea what he was doing, watching the Gryffindor team run through drills.

Two years, how could it have been two years since he’d first faced off against Steve Rogers? But Rogers had been the talk of the school back then, recruited straight into the Gryffindor Quidditch team as soon as he entered his second year, small and scrawny and a natural at flying: he couldn’t have looked more different from Harry Potter, but everyone talked and thought about him in exactly that way anyway.

Bucky cringed, now, and wanted a scarf to hide his burning cheeks. At least he hadn’t been alone in being an idiot; at least the other teams had been hesitant to play, too.

The first five fouls should have taught him better.

Now Bucky stared, helpless and breathless, as Rogers attempted to more or less dive-bomb one of the others straight out of the sky. Part of him wanted to laugh, and the rest of him wanted to find a broom and take flight and --

And what?

His heart lifted, flew up into his throat, as Rogers rocketed into the sky.

*

There was just enough space for him now in the top row of the stands, and he excused himself past several ranks of cheering Hufflepuffs, and Steve blew warm air onto his chilled fingertips and kept looking up into a sky full of streaking shadows: the whirlwind dance of Quidditch, up and down and sideways and in every possible direction.

Not for the first time, he thought that there might be as many definitions of what a Seeker was as there were Seekers themselves. Some of them led and some of them followed, and some of them were focused on nothing but the Golden Snitch and some of them looked at the entirety of the pitch.

There was a strategy to the game, and there was a beauty to it, and Steve couldn’t stop watching one particular Hufflepuff player, who whooped and laughed as he dove past teammates and opponents alike -- who seized the Snitch, an hour into the game, with blazing brazen eyes.

*

Bucky thought he could recognize the footsteps coming up to him; he unwrapped a Chocolate Frog and jammed the card into his pocket without even looking at it. “Want chocolate?”

“I’ll pass, thanks.”

Bucky made a face at the swish-and-flick of a wand and the sudden smell of mints. “I almost think you might be addicted to that stuff.”

“You say that every time,” Yelena said, and he could see her smirk in the shadowed glass of the old cabinets. “It’s tasty.”

“I only eat those mints when I have to.”

“And that’s your loss.” He watched her squint at one of the trophies; from where he was standing, he couldn’t read the year engraved on it, and only knew from the emblazoned snake that it had gone to Slytherin House.

“Big game tomorrow,” Yelena muttered.

“There will never be a bigger one,” Bucky agreed. “Until the next year, anyway.”

“Cold feet?”

“Yes. But don’t think that’s going to stop me.”

“I would never.” He heard her chew quietly and then swallow. The cool scent of her words. “We’ve been talking about strategy almost every week. I can’t imagine there was anything else that we could still talk about.”

“You’ve drilled everything into me,” Bucky said, gripping her shoulder briefly.

“And I have also learned a few things from you.”

Bucky finished off his chocolate, and turned toward her. “I’m going to miss you.”

A brief short chime of laughter. “It’s not like I’m going away.”

“But you’re leaving the team.”

“And the team will be yours to care for next year.” Now it was her turn to reach for his shoulder. “Don’t be afraid.”

“I’m not. At least not about -- Quidditch.”

He watched her expression change. “If you’re afraid of Rogers -- ”

“Sort of. I underestimated him. I don’t want to do that again.” Bucky sighed. “Except that saying it won’t make it happen.”

“No, I believe making it happen is up to you. And to him.”

He took the hand that was extended toward him.

Yelena smiled. “If it makes you feel any better, I have a friend on the Gryffindor team -- ”

“Why am I not surprised -- ”

“And she says he goes to your matches. She says he goes to watch you. Just as I know that you watch him, in practice or in his own matches.”

Bucky blinked and opened his mouth.

She held up a hand and he closed it. “Bucky. Just -- ask him. What harm can come of it?”

“Thanks for hexing it,” Bucky said, affectionately.

“You’re welcome.”

*

Long low rolling roar: it came from over their heads and yet Steve could feel it coming up through the soles of his feet. Pinning him in place.

“Have they ever been this loud before?” Maria asked as she came in from the showers, carrying her Keeper’s helmet in one hand.

“Maybe they’ve always been this loud and we never noticed before,” Sharon said. A pair of goggles dangled from her wrist.

“They’re always this loud at the final,” Melinda said. “Every final, every year.”

“You would know,” Sharon said, and Steve was not the only one to reach for Melinda, to pat her on the back or on the shoulder. “Last one for you.”

“Last one here,” Melinda said. A smile, small and slight and sweeping all of them in towards her. “Gather around, please.”

Steve grinned and linked arms with Sam on one side and Natasha on the other.

“If you want to win this match you have to give your best,” Melinda said, steel in her eyes and in her voice that Steve admired and tried to emulate now, by standing as tall and as straight as he could. “Give your best, and more. Give it everything that you’ve got. The Hufflepuffs will do the same. You know they will.” Melinda looked down, for a moment, and then put her hand into the center of the circle.

Steve put his hand atop hers, and the others followed suit.

“Let’s play. Let’s give it our all. We’ll win the cup or we won’t. But if we give it our all it won’t matter. We’ll still have played the best match of the year. And that’s all I want, really.”

“I’ll do my best,” Steve said, in the midst of the determined murmurs that followed.

“I know I can count on you. Up Gryffindor,” Melinda said, and Steve was the first to yell in response.

And once he was out on the pitch he looked up, out, past the frantically cheering school, and he hadn’t been looking for the Hufflepuff Seeker but there he was.

Impulsively, Steve kicked off and maneuvered himself into position, exactly opposite Bucky Barnes. “Nice to see you again.”

He wasn’t expecting a response, wasn’t expecting the smile. “Likewise. Shall we kick arse?”

“Yes.” And Steve held out his hand.

Bucky Barnes took it. A good hard grip.

They held on until the whistle blew.

*

Rogers had beaten him to the first move, and now Bucky had just beaten Rogers to the Snitch, and Bucky knew what he had to do.

But first he had to help lift the cup, and first he had to be enfolded in Yelena’s embrace, and first he had to hear her say, “The team is yours.”

“Thanks,” he murmured, thickly. “I’ll try to be a good captain. I’ll try to follow your example.”

“Just be yourself, you’ll be fine,” she said. “Now go get your Gryffindor.”

And there were no scarlet kits to be found on the pitch for the hordes of screaming and laughing and happy Hufflepuffs, and Bucky had to submit to a lot of handshakes and back-slapping, and he turned towards the team quarters --

“Congratulations,” Rogers said. He was still wearing his gloves, but he’d shed most of his kit. He was wearing jumpers, more than one of them judging by the sleeves, judging by the crooked shoulders.

“Thanks,” Bucky said, and then he added, “Hold out your hand.”

Head tilted to the side. A questioning look, oddly warm. And absolute trust: Bucky looked at Rogers’s gloved hand, and took it, and when he let go the Golden Snitch from the match was in Rogers’s hand.

And Rogers was smiling. “I’ll keep this safe.”

“Until I ask for it back,” Bucky said.

Rogers nodded. Stepped closer.

Bucky let himself lean in.

Let himself look, with the bated breath of an imminent catch, as Rogers smiled.


	2. Chapter 2

Bright pinpoints of light overhead, and soft sweet music woven into the soughing of the wind through vines and gently swaying branches: and Steve smiled, passed through into the largest of the greenhouses, and found the party well underway.

“Butterbeer?” A battered bowler hat that was still too big for its wearer’s head.

“Cheers, Tim,” Steve said, and clinked bottles with him.

Other greetings, other Houses: Emma and Moira of Slytherin and Hufflepuff, respectively. Kurt, the Ravenclaw Seeker, laughing with several friends next to the punch bowl. Kitty and Daisy and Franklin, all from Steve’s own house, who waved enthusiastically at him as he passed by.

The center of the greenhouse, normally occupied by long serried ranks of pots and plants, had been cleared for this one night: and at one end of that narrow space stood a gnarled tree-trunk and graceful outstretched branches, from which sprouted a multitude of softly shimmering leaves. He’d been hearing rumors about it, a group effort by several Hufflepuff Sixth-years, to be presented to Headmistress McGonagall at the end of the term.

As Steve watched a leaf fell from the tree and he moved forward to catch it, and the deep green of its veins seemed edged in gentle rainbow light.

And his steps brought him to the edge of the cleared space. A whirl of dance steps and intricate figures, and he almost thought about Quidditch, only with the bright sleeves of formal robes.

As he watched, the music came to an end, and the dancers laughed and clapped their hands and bowed to each other, and it was only when one of them put his hands through the dark hair that had escaped its braid that Steve recognized Bucky.

Bucky, who was a sight in his blue robes: blue as dark as the deepening dusk falling over Hogwarts.

Steve couldn’t help but fidget as Bucky smiled and drew closer -- and, instinctively, Steve drew his wand and murmured a Sticking Charm towards his other hand.

“Steve?” Bucky asked, gently puzzled.

Steve smiled, and attached the shimmering leaf he’d caught from the tree to Bucky’s collar.

Bucky’s smile turned into something bright and pleased and brilliant, the lights in his eyes reflecting the light of the tree -- shining for Steve alone.

“Let’s dance,” Steve whispered, as the music struck up anew.

_**the end - and the beginning** _

**Author's Note:**

> I am also on [tumblr](http://ninemoons42.tumblr.com/).


End file.
